Of Serpico and Cagney
by Flash Foreward
Summary: A knock on Lilly Rush's door, a man that won't give up. It's all too much for Lilly Rush.


**A/N:** This takes place after the episode "Ghost of My Child" which is the finale of season 5 (episode 18). The title comes from episode 16 of season 5 where Lilly Rush refers to Eddie Saccardo as "Serpico" (reference to an Al Pacino movie from 1973) and Eddie refers to Lilly as "Cagney" (reference to the 80s TV show "Cagney & Lacey").

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Cold Case

**Of Serpico and Cagney**

**Part One:  
Cagney**

There was a small ball of white fluff curled up on my couch when I got home, and the sight helped me relax. Working with Eddie Saccardo was…interesting, to say the least. Just when I thought I had him figured out, when I thought I knew his game, he would change it up completely and I was left wondering how I'd missed it before.

But coming home, seeing my cats, going through my routine, it pushed all of that out of my mind.

So the sight of that white cat made me smile, and I ran my hand through her fur on my way through to the kitchen; where I found Olivia watching me, her one eye peering out from her orange face. She was hungry.

"Hey, sweetie," I murmured, bending down to scratch her ears. She purred softly, pushing her head against my fingers, and I felt a smile creep onto my face.

She mewed and tilted her head to lap lightly at my wrist with her tiny, pink tongue. I chuckled lightly at the sight before opening the cupboard beside me and pulling out the cat food. I stood again and walked carefully to the bowls by the fridge, trying not to step on Olivia as she weaved between my legs, mewing and purring in gratitude.

"Here you go," I said as I filled up her bowl and checked her water.

She started right in as soon as I backed away, and I smiled more as I watched. Eventually, I knew I'd have to put the food away and go to bed, but watching Olivia helped wash away all the bad memories that our just closed case had dug up.

Memories of myself and Chris cowering on my bed as we listened to our mother, drunk and angry, throwing a tantrum downstairs; memories of wondering when (if) my mother would be coming home, and who would be with her, and how out of it she would be. Memories I wished I didn't have.

Watching my cats, though, brought back better memories. Memories of the promises I made to myself and to whatever children may wait in my future; memories of closed cases, the faces of family members when justice is served and closure is reached; and, most of all, memories of the survivors, the people who made it.

People like me.

There was a knock at the door and the memories returned to the back of my mind. I shook my head, wondering who it could be at this hour and coming up with only one answer: Scotty Valens.

With a reluctant sigh, urged on by a second knock, I returned the cat food to its cupboard and retraced my earlier steps through the living room to the front door. More knocks, louder and more frequent, caused me to quicken my pace and I was worried by the time I reached the door and pulled it open…to find the tanned face and cocky smile of Eddie Saccardo before me.

He shoved his hands in his pockets and shrugged. His nonchalance annoyed me, and that annoyance quickly replaced my worry. I crossed my arms over my chest and cast him a glare, the glare I've used on hardened criminals and gotten them to cave.

His smile grew, almost revealing his teeth.

"What do you want?" I demanded. Now, his smile spread to show his teeth and he held his hands up in mock defense.

"Whoa, there, Rush," he said, a touch of laughter behind his voice. "No need to get hostile, I just thought you and me aught to have a conversation."

"A conversation?" I queried. "What about?" He shrugged.

"What d'you think?"

I shook my head, trying to decide if he was serious. His smile made me think he was just here to get a rise out of me, but there was something else. Something in his eyes that made me want to believe him.

But it was late, and I was tired.

It was Olivia and her sister meowing that made up my mind. They were waiting for me. So, I shook my head again and reached for the door.

"Sorry, Saccardo," I said. "I've had a long day." And, without waiting for his response, I shut the door, locked it and, making sure my cats were with me, made my way to my bedroom. I got ready quickly and was soon curled up in bed, drifting off to my usual restless sleep.

My dreams, though, were different this time.

_Eddie's standing there, by my desk, looking at me with his brow creased. And he looks like he can see through me. Like he already knows the answers to the questions he's asking. Like he knows why these cases get to me._

_Then he's sitting there, talking to Priscilla, calm instead of cocky. And he's talking about using, about what it's like. And now he's just as much a mystery to me as I am to him, and for the first time I wonder why he went into narcotics._

I woke with a start, disrupting Olivia as I sat up. She mewed angrily and shifted her position. I sighed and flicked on the light. The clock said it was half past three, and the still dark sky outside my window confirmed the early hour.

But, though this dream was different than my usual nightmares, I knew I would not be able to go back to sleep.

I slipped carefully out from under my covers, doing my best not to disturb the girls. I noticed that Olivia's sister wasn't in her usual place, and I figured she had padded back downstairs for a drink of water; but Olivia was curled up by the foot of the bed, breathing deeply, and I smiled at the sight.

She looked so peaceful.

As I watched her, I thought over my options for the rest of the night. I could find a book or watch television, maybe one of those would put me to sleep; or I could give in to the fact that I was awake for the remaining hours until my alarm went off and do something productive.

I decided to mull it over with a cup of tea.

I left Olivia dozing and headed down to the kitchen, flicking on lights as I went, re-illuminating my home. In the kitchen, I set up the kettle and prepared a cup, glancing at the food bowls as I waited for the water to heat up and finding my cat was nowhere in the room.

I peered out the door at the couch, and there she was, her three legs curled underneath her and her eyes fixed on me. She blinked, tilting her head to the side, then she turned her head to look behind her at the front door.

As if on cue, someone knocked.

I quickly switched off the stove and removed the kettle from its burner. I waited a few seconds, straining my ears, and when I heard a second knock I rushed through the living room, up the stairs to my bedroom where I slipped my gun from its holster before returning to the stairs.

I took them slowly this time, counting knocks as though they were claps of thunder, my gun held securely in my hand.

"Who is it?" I called when I reached the door again. No one responded for a few seconds, but I could have sworn I heard a strangled cough and my grip on the gun tightened.

"It's Serpico," a familiar voice called and I relaxed a little. I unlocked the door and pulled it open to once again find Eddie Saccardo on my front stoop. He glanced at my gun and amusement lit up his eyes as they returned to my face.

"Why are you still here?" I asked. He smiled.

"'Cause you haven't invited me in," he replied, looking at me expectantly.

"And it never occurred to you that I wasn't going to?" I countered. A look of hurt crossed his face, though I was sure it was feigned, but he quickly regained composure and shrugged.

"I thought you might cave," was his response. I shook my head.

"So, knocking on my door at three in the morning seemed like a good idea to you?" I asked, changing the subject. "You nearly gave me a heart attack."

And there was that cocky grin again.

"Your lights were on," he said. "I didn't think you'd mind."

"Have you been watching my house all night?"

"No, I went to get some dinner, then I came back and waited."

"Waited for what?" I leaned against the door frame and crossed my arms, the gun still heavy in my hand.

"You to wake up," he replied. "Now, can I come in?" he asked. "It's kind of cold out here."

"How did you know I would wake up?"

"Most people do eventually," he said. I nodded.

"You wanted to talk to me that badly?" I asked. He shrugged and nodded towards the living room.

"Cute cat, what's her name?" he asked. I spun around and saw that Olivia had made her way downstairs and was poised behind me, studying Saccardo.

"Um, Olivia," I mumbled, turning back to him. He nodded and grinned that aggravating grin again.

"So, can I come in or are you gonna let the bugs in and the heat out?" he asked. I sighed, but stepped aside to let him in. He brushed past me as he entered, his body close to mine, his coat rubbing lightly against my bare arm for a split second before he was in my living room reclining on my couch, obviously petting my white cat.

I stood there, stunned. He'd been so close, and I hadn't expected the effect that would have on my heart rate. I could feel it pounding in my chest, and I almost believed the change was caused by him coming in; but I quickly decided it must be left over adrenaline from his three thirty knocking spree.

"I'll be right back," I said, shutting the door. I ran up the stairs and returned my gun to its holster. I debated grabbing a sweatshirt to throw on over my spaghetti strap tank-top, but decided it didn't matter since he'd already seen my thrown together pajamas.

I returned to the living room to find that he was now petting both my girls. I surveyed the scene from behind for a moment, thinking back to Kite and his nicknames and Joseph and…I cut my thoughts off there. Saccardo wasn't on par with Kite or Joseph. He was a colleague, nothing more.

I cleared my throat, causing him to jump and whip his head around to glare at me, and walked purposefully to the armchair by the window.

"Jeez, woman, you could give a guy a heart attack," Saccardo said, but his voice was light and there was a smile on his face, and I couldn't help but laugh a little at his reaction as well. But I quickly sobered up, preferring to cut to the chase and get him out of my house as quickly as possible.

"What do you want, Saccardo?" I asked.

"You don't waste any time, do you?" he responded. I sighed and leaned back in my chair.

"Would you prefer small talk and beating around the bush?" I countered. He looked down at my cats, cooing at them and scratching them behind their ears, and I fought a smile at the sight. "Saccardo," I tried again, warningly. "Talk."

"All right, Rush," he said, looking up at me and leaning forward. All of his focus was on me now, Olivia and her sister merely curled up beside him as I fell under his scrutiny. "You confound me," he said.

"Do I?" I responded. "I'll have to work on that." He shook his head.

"You don't get it," he said. "That's a good thing."

"A good thing?"

"Yeah, a good thing," he confirmed. "There are few people who confound me."

"Why's that?" I asked, hiding my interest behind a bored voice and a glance at the clock on the wall.

"I work with druggies and dealers all day, they're all pretty easy to read," he explained, moving his hand for emphasis as he spoke. "They're all motivated by the same things: want and need. Druggies need drugs, dealers want money. It's pretty simple.

"So simple," he leaned back as he spoke, pressing his hands together and tapping his chin with his combined forefingers. "So simple that sometimes I forget that not everyone's that easy to read."

"So," I finished for him, "it's a good thing when you find someone hard to read."

"Exactly."

Neither of us spoke after this, and we sat in a silence that bordered on the uncomfortable. He never took his eyes off me and I felt the need to keep my gaze on him, though my eyes often wound up wandering, unnerved by the intensity of his brown-eyed gaze and the effect it had on me.

I realized that, earlier, my inexplicably high heart-rate really had been caused by him.

Finally, I cleared my throat and returned my gaze to him, catching his eye and leaning forward, pressing my elbows against my thighs.

"What about me 'confounds' you, Saccardo?" I asked. He grinned.

"I thought you'd never ask," he said. "You ain't like other lady cops." I nodded at this, fairly sure I knew what was coming next. "You ain't angry at the system or the unfair judgment broads usually get in the working world. But…you are angry about somethin', and that's what confounds me.

"I can't figure out what it is."

"Did it ever occur to you," I asked, "that I didn't want you to know?"

"Yeah," he said, standing. "It did. But that don't stop me from wondering." He paced beside the couch for a few steps, then whirled to face me, pointing down at me with one hand, the other shoved in his pocket, still nonchalant. "But, I confound you, too."

"Oh, you do, do you?"

"I saw the way you looked at me when I was talkin' to Priscilla," he said. "You want to know my story." He stepped up to me and crouched down in front of me. "How about You tell me yours and I'll tell you mine?"

"We aren't in second grade, Saccardo," I said. "We don't share stories."

"Then how about we go back to kindergarten?" he countered. I squinted down at him in confusion, wondering what exactly his words meant, but my unasked question was soon answered as he cupped a hand behind my head and pressed his lips to mine.

For a moment, a brief lapse in judgment, I let it happen. But my brain quickly caught up with me and I pushed him away. He fell back onto the floor, recovering quickly and propping himself on an elbow as I stood and got as far from him as I could.

He was grinning, of course.

"We are not in kindergarten," I said. "And we aren't crouched in the shadows of some wooden playground while our friends run around wondering where we are."

"Why're you fightin' this, Rush?" was all he said, shrugging as he spoke. I glared at him, hands on my hips.

"Fighting what, Saccardo, there's nothing to fight." He shrugged.

"You let me into your house at three thirty in the morning and you don't think there's something you're fighting?"

"You said you wanted to talk to me."

"I did. I wanted to talk about this."

"What is there to talk about?"

He stood up and straightened out his coat and pressed the wrinkles from his pants, looking down, avoiding my gaze, I assumed. After a few moments of truly awkward silence he looked up at me and cleared his throat.

"I dunno what this is," he said. "And I really don't care to explore it or whatever the hell else people do about stuff like it now-a-days."

"Then why are you here?" I asked.

"Because you confound me," he replied. And we were back where we began.

"Get out," I said, crossing to the door and pulling it open. "Go home, Saccardo." He nodded.

"G'night," he whispered, brushing past me out the door. I nodded to his retreating form and watched from the doorway as he climbed into his car, subconsciously raising a hand to wave goodbye as he drove off. When his car disappeared around a corner, I carefully closed the door and locked it, then, turning off the lights as I went, headed back to my bed. I curled up under the blankets, comforted by the feeling of my cats settling down at my feet, and slowly drifted back to sleep.


End file.
